The Standards for Registered Training Organisations (RTOs) 2015 includes clauses 1.9, 1.10 & 1.11 in Standard 1 requiring that the College implements systematic validation of assessment practices. Specifically, the standard requires:
Clause 1.9:
The RTO implements a plan for ongoing systematic validation of assessment practices and judgements that includes for each training product on the RTO’s scope of registration:
- when assessment validation will occur;
- which training products will be the focus of the validation;
- who will lead and participate in validation activities; and
- how the outcomes of these activities will be documented and acted upon.
Clause 1.10:
For the purposes of Clause 1.9, each training product is validated at least once every five years, with at least 50% of products validated within the first three years of each five year cycle, taking into account the relative risks of all of the training products on the RTO’s scope of registration, including those risks identified by the VET Regulator.
Clause 1.11:
For the purposes of Clause 1.9, systematic validation of an RTO’s assessment practices and judgements is undertaken by one or more persons who are not directly involved in the particular instance of delivery and assessment of the training product being validated, and who collectively have:
- vocational competencies and current industry skills relevant to the assessment being validated;
- current knowledge and skills in vocational teaching and learning; and
- the training and assessment qualification or assessor skill set referred to in Item 1 or 3 of Schedule 1.
Industry experts may be involved in validation to ensure there is the combination of expertise set out in (a) to (c) above.
To ensure that all of the College’s VET training programs are systematically validated.
The policy relates to all VET training courses (training packages and accredited courses) and units of competency.
The College shall validate each VET training packages and accredited courses within three years of the course being added to the College’s scope of registration. When a VET training package or accredited course has been on the College’s scope of registration at least five years it will be validated at least once in each subsequent five year cycle.
The College shall validate at least half of its training courses within the first three years of each five year cycle.
The validation of assessment in a training package or accredited course will comply with the following principles:
- the validation will assess whether the assessment judgements being made are valid and whether they are being consistently applied;
- the validation shall review policies, and procedures in addition to individual assessment decisions;
- no-one directly involved in the delivery or assessment of a unit of competency may conduct the validation of the unit on their own;
- it is conducted by a person or panel with vocational competencies and current industry skills relevant to the assessment being validated;
- it is conducted by a person or panel with current knowledge and skills in vocational teaching and learning;
- the involvement of independent industry experts is recommended;
- The students’ work examined in the validation process must comply with ASQA’s guidelines.
A formal report shall be made for each validation activity and any recommendations will be reviewed by the Director of VET, for implementation by the Manager, VET courses and the relevant course coordinator.
Any improvements from the validation of selected units will be applied to all the units within the training package or accredited course.